


The House That Hate Built

by FracturedSpine



Category: Call of Duty (Video Games)
Genre: Haunted House, More characters to come, Ultimis Crew, Victis Crew, ghost story, more tags to come, old timey horror story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-01
Updated: 2019-04-01
Packaged: 2019-12-30 12:41:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18315467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FracturedSpine/pseuds/FracturedSpine
Summary: With their nation on the brink of war, a small group of scientists and a young child are forced to take on an old abandoned stately home as their research laboratory. But as time goes on, one of the scientists falls ill and will ultimately plunge the house into darkness and create the tales of horror that such as building is synonymous with.





	1. An Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> Right, so I haven't posted in a while. This is gonna be a stylised fic, I suppose in two parts. I have created a tumblr account with the same name so you can pm me and be like "yo, where the f*** is the next chapter?" and hopefully I will respond. This was, as you can probably tell, a Halloween fic, but that never happened.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We meet our antagonist.

It is likely that you have never heard of the tragedy of Griffin House and why should you? A series of deaths that occurred over eighty years ago, never reported by the press, masked by the government. The memory of the tragedy only held by the local townspeople. That is why I wish to share you this story, for soon the tale shall be long forgotten, buried with only those who remembered it. I must tell you this story, as a warning, a warning to never set foot in that old crumbling building, to never wander upon its grounds. For even eighty years later, those events are so poignant it may as well have happened yesterday. 

In order for the you, the reader, to truly understand the awful events that took place all those years ago, you must get acquainted to our antagonist; Griffin House. Griffin House was a house like no other. It may appear from the outside to be nothing more than a decrepit old rotting building, abandoned in its time of need, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Griffin House was an evil house, left to waste in fear of what lurked there, in fear of the horrors that had occurred. Whilst tragedies had almost frequently happened there since the very beginning, the house had become synonymous with one date; October 31st.  
I can see what you are thinking.  
This house has nothing to do with the juvenile celebration of Halloween. The events of that cold night in 1936 had nothing to do with werewolves or witches.  
Just the house and the thirteen poor souls who inhabited it.  
For house it knew, it always knew. It could sense the good in people, the innocence, the pure… for that was what it fed upon. It fed upon the destruction that it brought, the chaos. It had learned to manifest itself so that something as mundane as the kitchen sink, suddenly became a weapon of murderous torture. Perhaps that seems a little far fetched, even childish. The creatures of the night are nothing more than a childish imagination with a simple rational explanation. But what if there is suddenly no explanation for the creatures we see. What then if a being that we have so strictly warned of stands before us as clear as day? What then? Do you scream and run away? Do you freeze, frantically racking your brain for a ‘rational explanation’? Do you tell yourself that everything you have been told is wrong, that these creatures do exist? Everyone will brand you insane if you do.  
Locked up and the key thrown away simply for seeing the unimaginable.  
It seems rather cruel, doesn’t it?  
Hidden from society simply because they can see, because they have a sixth sense or so to speak.  
Some people would call it a gift, but I can tell you it is a curse. For when man dies they no longer have a place amongst the living. They can no longer be deemed human as they possess no humanity.  
So what of the case of Griffin House? Many will willingly believe that the trauma that occurred there happened through natural means. A mere madman hellbent on the destruction of his fellow man.  
But unfortunately things are never that simple.  
They never did catch their ‘madman’. 

But first one must start with the history of Griffin House, its life before this incident, the incident that caused the even the house’s very name to become feared amongst the people of the town. The reason its stands empty now… well almost empty. This house had been many things through is long decaying life. Originally built as a stately home, it then became a nursing home, and finally during the 1930s it became a research laboratory were it was finally left to rot. Naturally one would assume that the troubles started with the experiments performed within the walls of this building, or even with the misery and tragedies seen within the times of the nursing home, but you would assume wrongly. The troubles occurred right from the start, when the very first brick was laid upon the rotten soil. It was cursed from the start. Cursed by its undeserving owners. For the Griffin family that had birthed our antagonist were mad, insane, cruel and evil. Griffin House never truly was a stately home, it was an asylum for the unstable and rich to hide away from society. They obsessed over the house in a vain attempt to make it perfect. No wall was clean enough, no floor was polished enough. The house it knew not love, but obsession and possession and it could not tell the difference. And the house, it took on their persona. Upon their deaths the house weeped and it sought vengeance. It trapped their souls within its walls and never let them leave.  
The Griffin’s never had any children and as it seemed, no immediate family, but inevitably some distant sixth cousin of someone's aunt inherits these things. They think they’ve won the lottery. A huge mansion and acres of land. Ka-ching!  
But who buys these things? Who will buy Griffin House?  
Griffin House was never a pretty building. It was ugly. Distorted by out of place extensions and a mess of styles. If it were a person, it would have looked like Frankenstein’s Monster. 

So Griffin House would never be sold as a residential home, in fact it would never become a residential home again. Not now, not ever. No one would live there willingly. And so though fate it became a nursing home for the ill and elderly, bought by a guileless young man as an attempted career. But the House it responded. It responded in hate. For those who resided in its walls were not welcome. It sought prejudice against them. It did not want them. The Griffin’s did not want them. The residents no longer felt safe. If anyone of them were alive today they would tell you long tales of the terrors of hauntings. So many, it could be written into volumes. It had started quietly. Naturally one would use the explanation of rats or mice for the unexplainable, the banging on the walls, the sounds of footsteps along the corridor. But then things escalated. The sounds of screaming, the sight of a spectre wandering the halls in a soiled dress. Rats were not an explanation. And then came the deaths. The water had looked a muddy brown to begin with, but this is not my place to judge. The water had been contaminated with lime. As they watched the victims foam at the mouth, crying before drowning in their own blood and saliva, all eyes looked for the perpetrator. Three people lost their lives and the owner lost his freedom, bound to a life in jail.  
A hideous cackling could be heard echoing from the rafters. 

 

Rumours began to spread about Griffin House and its nature. It became known as a vile heap of brick and mortar on the outskirts of town. No one dared to venture near it. None of the staff would stay after dark, for they saw things, heard things that were deemed impossible. The maids would fall ill, poisoned by the house itself and the madness it wrought, driving them to their deaths so that they could live forever, trapped within the rotting walls of Griffin House.  
People often say that a house is like a body, the pipes the veins, the rooms the organs, the windows the eyes. Griffin House never had a heart.  
Whether it was in the flawed plans of the house or the architects sudden death brought by sorrow, we shall never know. All we know is that Griffin House is not a fit place for mankind.

When the house finally became a research laboratory in 1936, it had stood empty for well over a decade. Of course people had come and gone, spent the night or two and then fled in horror. But yet the groundskeepers stayed loyal, prolonging its death, maintaining it. They had worked in that house all their lives and could not bare to see its downfall. They knew all the terrors of that house and yet they stayed. It was like a twisted relationship, they hated one another, but yet could not bare to be alone. So they stayed. The groundskeepers entered the House on their terms and their terms alone. They would never enter the house for more than a few hours at a time and never after dark. But still without an owner and proper maintenance, the house crumbled. Those years of solitude had not been kind on the house. It had once stood so proudly, not even a spot on the walls, now it was lame and broken. Abandoned. All the townsfolk knew better than to set foot upon its grounds, to help nurse the once magnificent building back to health. It would be like walking into the den of a starved tiger. 

Eventually, as no willing owner could be found, Griffin House fell into the hands of the government. Naturally they tried to auction it, sell it, plans to renovate it into a garrison for officers, demolish it, turn it into farmland. This list goes on and yet they all fell through. And so the house it sat there, waiting. Until, at the beginning of war, a small group of scientists were gifted the rotting house. Naturally, these scientist protested. What use is a stately home as a research complex? But their nation had other ideas, ideas that revolved around the grandeur of war and so money was spent on guns and bullets whilst its people starved. They had no choice but to take on the house. They were given a small amount of money to renovate the house on the pretence of one man, and one man alone. His name would become immortalised, but never in the way he intended. 

This is the story of one place in particular, the story of Griffin House and what really did happen on the night of October 31st 1936.


	2. 24th October

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (Seven nights before the incident)  
> Our group of scientists move into their new laboratory only for one of them to remember something that they wished they could forget.

And so Griffin House became a laboratory when all else had rejected it. It had been granted to those poor scientists and doctors by their distant government. This was the best they would get and to many of them, the idea of a large, empty stately home exited them. It gave them room to breathe, it gave them more home comfort than a concrete factory ever could. But when those men, woman and young child entered the doors of that house for the first time it knew. The house watched in eager anticipation, silently sensing their naivety, their innocence, their goodwill. It watched as a girl no more than ten or eleven, ran through the halls, skipping with childish excitement. It watched as an older man with a stark white beard and archaic glasses called out to her; a warning. Yes, she would do well to heed his warning.  
“Samantha, don’t wander off. I don’t want you getting lost.” The girl gave a quick glance back at the man before slowly stepping further into the house.  
“It’s okay, Uncle Edward was going to show me around.” She smiled in reply, in childish awe of the house, imagining the great many adventures she would have, imagining what lay in every room, still to be discovered. Imagining the stories she could tell. How naive.  
“Speaking of Edward, where the devil is he?” Samantha shrugged her shoulders at the man’s words, causing him to glance around for said man, looking for him as if he was going to be hidden under the worn Persian rug of the foyer.  
He was just about to shout for his assistant when he heard a call from just outside the house.  
“I’m here, Doctor Maxis.”  
All it took was those four words and the house it stopped and stared. The last man to step foot within its threshold. The house, it could sense that this man was different to the others. He felt wrong. There was no innocence, no good will. Instead he reeked of evil and cruelty… of insanity. It has been a long time since someone like him had walked through its halls. It is difficult to describe the emotions it felt for houses do not feel, but Griffin House is no ordinary house. If anything the lumps of brick could be described as surprised, excited. For the house rejoiced at the thought of the Griffins returning, but as the man walked deeper within, it grew wary. This man would not and could not be like the Griffins. He held no obsessive desire for the house’s upkeep, instead he hummed of its destruction, a hatred… almost a lust for it.  
“About time.” Doctor Maxis scoffed, but the other waved the words away.  
“I still don’t think that a building in this state of disrepair is suitable for a laboratory.” Edward chided, looking up to his employer in vexation. Maxis merely rolled his eyes as if the other man’s irritability was a daily occurrence.  
“It’s all the government will grant us Richtofen and of course with you being a General you probably live in a house larger than this.” Maxis chose this as his time to leave. He did not have time to start an argument with his assistant. Not today of all days. But his assistant wasn’t having any of it.  
“I am a Generalmajor and no I don’t.” Richtofen snapped in reply. Maxis merely frowned. “Generalmajor, General same thing.” Maxis had had enough. “Only a couple more victories for the fatherland and you’re promoted.” He watched as Edward registered where this conversation was headed. Maxis had never had a thing for war. He had never approved for his assistant to stay on in the military. Wherever he could, he had tried to bar the other man’s promotions, but it had all been in vain. He didn’t want to admit it, but his colleagues ties had proved useful, even if somewhat suicidal and so Maxis continued. “Meanwhile the true workers of the land plough on through thick and thin, whilst you, the officers-”  
He was cut off before he would get a chance to finish his little speech. Edward stared at him venomously, his hand whether instinctively, or as a threat reached for his pistol. He forgot that the other man was always armed.  
“Saying things like that will get you hanged, Dr Maxis.” Richtofen hissed before marching off.  
Dr Maxis sighed, looking that the frayed carpet. War had changed his assistant and it was times like these he questioned where his loyalties lay. He wondered if Edward even cared about helping mankind, or only its destruction. Only time would tell. 

Samantha Maxis thought herself truly lost. She had done precisely what her adoptive father had told her not to do. Slowly, as she peered inside one of the rooms, she decided that it would be best to attempt to retrace her steps, that was, if she could remember which way she had come. The house with its long twisting corridors and numerous rooms was easy to get lost in, especially for a child. As she tentatively went back the way she came, desperately attempting to remember her steps, she heard voices. She stopped and listened, attempting to locate them. She could work out one of the voices as one of her father’s colleagues, Dr Yena and the high pitched and somewhat angered voice of her Uncle Edward. Edward was of no blood relation to her, but yet she had known him almost as long as Mr Maxis. They had been close friends, she knew that and that they had fought in the war together. 

She had always liked Edward. She found his unusually high-pitched voice funny and he was often kind to her. She preferred it when he read to her as he knew how to do all of the voices of the characters in the story. Sometimes, when both men were busy with their work, Dr Maxis’ secretary, Sophia, would read to her. She tried to think of Sophia as a motherly figure, like Maxis had suggested, but truthfully she did not like her. Samantha believed the feeling to be mutual. She also knew that Uncle Edward did not trust her, and that was enough for her. 

But at the moment, she couldn’t help but notice that Edward and her father seemed to be disagreeing on things more than usual. She had put it down to their work. Her father always told her he was busy and so she found herself spending more time with Edward and Sophia or even her dog, Fluffy. But Sophia had her dog now, so she was stuck all alone, until she found the whereabouts of Dr Yena. She found the men bickering in a what was one of the many bed rooms. The peeling paint upon the walls was of a nauseous lime green and the carpet a light blue. The once white net curtains were faded and stained to a murky yellow and the room smelt of what only can be described as the ill health that comes with old age. Both men immediately stop talking the moment they noticed her stood in the doorway, but yet their expressions remained.  
“You look angry, Edward. Has father yelled at you again?” She teased. The man in question, sighed as he turned his back on her, unpacking numerous documents and books from a box, dropping them on an old pine desk with a heavy thud.  
“Your father is a Marxist.” Edward stated as if the answer was clear, subsequently crossing his arms as if to challenge her. But yet she stared in disbelief, confused as to what the man meant.  
“A what?” She questioned, a hint of anger in her voice, incase he was insulting her father. Instead, Dr Yena smiled, gripping Edward’s shoulder as if he had just told a particularly good joke.  
“Honestly, Edward. Don’t go filling her head with politics. She’s too young for that kind of nonsense.”  
“I’m not too young!” Samantha protested, as most children would of her age. Instead Edward smiled and returned to his work. Yena, realising that he had ultimately created an argument and not something he wanted to embark on, changed the subject.  
“And what are you doing up here, anyway?”  
“I got lost.” Both Yena and Richtofen made eye contact, as if silently deciding on who would be the one to return the girl to her father. Edward sighed, having lost the silent battle, but his smile remained in place. He held one of her shoulders and led her out of the door.  
“Come on, let's find Fluffy.” 

As they walked down the long corridor towards one of the staircases, Edward watched as Samantha toyed with her blouse. He had known her long enough to know that that was her tell tale habit of nerves. Upon realising that he had noticed, Samantha spoke of what was on her mind.  
“I don’t think I like this place.” She muttered studying the worn carpet. She knew she sounded childish and she knew that if she told her father she would tell her she was being so.  
“No? And why’s that?” He did not make eye contact with her, they just kept on walking.  
“It just feels bad.” Her words make him chuckle.  
“Feels bad? Samantha, you’re going to have to be more precise than that.” A hint of humour in his voice. She frowned knowing that she was going to have to be honest.  
“I feel like there’s someone watching me.” She looked at him then and the smile faded from his lips. Edward suddenly stopped and rapidly glanced behind him. His actions only confirmed Samantha’s suspicions, but then he saw her face and grinned.  
“Can you see anyone else?” He asked. Samantha glanced around herself.  
“No.” She shook her head.  
“Can you hear anyone else?” Again Samantha, stopped, listening. She could hear the birds through the single pane windows, the rustle of trees in the window. The gentle creak of the house as it settled in the wind, but no sounds of other people.  
“No.” She repeated.  
“And neither can I. There is nobody watching you.” He took her hand and led her down the iron staircase. 

 

000000000000

_He could feel the cold drizzle of rain across his face and arms, his greatcoat long ago discarded. He breathed in the miasma of churned up mud, gunpowder and the sickly smell of rot. He watched in silence as the distant white light of artillery shells lit up sky. This had been his solace for so long, watching the beautifully grotesque explosions of mud and inevitably men. He twiddled his thumbs, itching for a cigarette, but yet he had none. Nothing was something he had in abundance. He didn’t want to think about where his next cigarette would come from, what corpse his comrades would have to pull them from. Abandoning himself from his wretched thoughts, he turned his back and retreated to his small shelter._

__

_Even several miles behind the front lines he could still feel the ground shudder with the bombardment of shells. It was as if it was in pain, flinching at the brass bullets. He picked up his lukewarm cup of ersatz coffee, something he was pretty sure was more charcoal than coffee and drained the last dregs. He knew he should try to sleep, but the moment he closed his eyes, he was met with their faces. The faces contorted with pain and terror, eyes sunken, skin grey. They looked more dead than alive. A commander had once called them Untoten. He felt disgusted._

__

_In the corner on the rickety old table that had been salvaged from a burnt out french farm, sat his Pickelhaube. The glaring red numbers of his division burnt his eyes, reminding him of what he had been doing all day. He was sure he would never want to see the colour red again. He had never actually worn the helmet. It was made from leather and so offered no actual protection. Thus, he had decided, it gave him no reason to wear it. He had never taken to uniforms. He hated them. Almost immediately he had diguarded his grey jacket and instead walked about in his white dress shirt, the sleeves rolled up past his elbows. But the colour white is too pure for war. It did not take long for his crisp shirt to be ruined. He was a field surgeon after all._  
_He looked more like a murderer than a doctor.  
Was this where he earned his nickname, The Butcher?_

____

__

_____ _

_He attempted to lie down of the edge of his bed, a bed that comprised of no more than a few itchy woolen blankets and a rusting iron bed. He was grateful for having a bed. He knew others who weren’t so lucky. But as he closed his eyes he could hear the sound of the ambulance stumbling over the mud as it brought back the injured and the dead. And so the faces returned to his mind. He lay there, still and silent, playing dead in a desperate hope that his memories would leave him. He held his breath and began to count._

__

_“Edward, sorry to disturb your sleep.”_  
_He opened his eyes and and released his breath to find an officer stood in his doorway. He gave a forced smile. Sleeping was something that everyone appeared to be struggling with. “There’s a man out there who keeps on calling for you. He seems desperate.”_  
_Edward nodded, standing up and running his fingers through his dark hair. He followed the officer out of the shelter where he spied one of his colleagues mercilessly pacing back and forwarth outside, tugging on his shirt sleeve so hard that Edward was sure it would rip._  
_“Edward! I-I didn’t know who else… I need your help...” He looked into Edward’s eyes, and all he could see was fear and a manic hopelessness. He was pale, and in the darkness of the night, he resembled the wounded with his sunken eyes and pained expression._  
_“Dr Schuster, what is it?” He uttered, grasping his colleague by the arm and holding him steady. He felt the other’s muscles twitch under his jacket, as if he wanted to turn and flee._  
_“Edward, please. Please, it’s my brother. You have to help him.”_  
_His words, yet filled with such ambiguity were understood all too well._  
_The grief of loss._  
_This is war._  
_Edward swallowed hard, taking a shaky breath before speaking his next words._  
_“Where is he?”_  
_He watched in a shared distress as the man before him re-registered what had happened._  
_How his brother would not be coming home.  
_ _“The 21st, they-they were attacked… the British…”_

__

_He led Schuster inside of his quarters and gestured for him to sit on his bed. He began making coffee, but yet over the sounds of the pathetic wood stove, the hum of an engine could be heard and the shouts of soldiers and doctors for assistance.  
Edward winced knowing he should probably help them. _

__

_And with the shouts came the screaming.  
The wounded, carried from the back of the ambulance. _

__

_Edward watched as the sounds only caused Schuster more distress, as he shifted in discomfort._  
_And then they both heard it.  
“...they’re from Aisne, 21st, I think. Caught ‘em off guard. Few survivors…”_

__

_Schuster was running. He began pushing through the crowds, charging towards the ambulances and soldiers. He began muttering his name to the nurses. Edward watched in pity as they shook their head over and over again. His voice maddening with every rejection._

__

_Edward felt a wave of nauseous anxiety wash over him as he stood there, frozen, unable to move, unable to help. He watched as he screamed his surname, chanting it over and over in a deranged grief. He felt guilty, shamed for watching this moment of raw emotion. He wanted to disappear, to return to Heidelberg, to never pick up a gun again in his life. He found himself, for a few precious moments, planning out his future, how he would become a theoretical scientist, how he’d live in a quaint little cottage on the edge of town, maybe he’d get a dog._  
_But the sound of screaming deafened his thoughts._  
_He watched in the poorly lit darkness as Schuster attempted to help one of the wounded. Slowly, Edward drew nearer. Little by little, Edward began to realised why the man was screaming. He wanted to vomit._  
_Schuster held the soldier’s hand, attempting to soothe him._  
_All efforts were in vain._  
_“Edward… please.”_  
_There were tears in Schuster’s eyes._  
_How desperately he wanted to lie, to tell them everything would be okay. Instead he found himself shaking his head. Another rejection._  
_And yet the boy kept on screaming.  
_ _The sounds loud and guttural in the night. He could not tell if they were from shock or pain, most likely both. A part of him just wanted him to shut up._

__

_He would die on his operating table that evening. He had done everything he could and Schuster knew that. The other doctors had stared at him in disbelief as he tried to perform the impossible. He had watched as he took his last breaths, whilst his ceaseless screaming became more garbled, red filling the corners of his mouth.  
He would haunt Edward for time to come; The man who would not stop screaming. He would see his face, mutilated and twisted, yet recognising, pleading for help. He would hear his howls, desperate but yet accusing, angered. He couldn’t help feel responsible. He did not blame the British for inflicting the injuries, nor did he blame his nation for starting the war, instead he blamed himself for failing. He had relieved the moment over and over. What if? _

__

__

__

And this is where his story began. His desire to cheat death. 

__

__

__

And as Edward lay down upon his bed for his first night in the house, he found that sleep would not come willingly. It is difficult to sleep when someone is watching you. He tossed and turned hoping that the figure would disappear, that it was nothing more than a morbid hallucination. For in the corner of the room, hunched over like a corpse, sat his co-worker’s brother, his body wounded from the shell explosion, untreated, rotting. His eye’s blank and glassy. And his mouth hung open as if he had screamed himself to death.

__

__

__

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I made Maxis a Marxist. lol. I think he even looks a bit like Karl Marx tbh.


End file.
